


The Thirteenth Chime

by skepticseptic



Category: Buzzfeed Unsolved (Web Series)
Genre: M/M, and oh shit there's ghosts, ryan takes over his grandmother's business
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-27
Updated: 2018-05-26
Packaged: 2019-04-28 13:20:48
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,002
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14450118
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skepticseptic/pseuds/skepticseptic
Summary: Accordingly, with very rare exceptions, when a clock chimes thirteen times it is indicating an impossible time. What better than an impossible time for an implausible occurrence?





	1. One Last Call

                The news of Ryan’s grandmother’s passing hit the family hard. She was a cornerstone in the town that she lived in and knew almost everybody who passed through her establishment by name. She ran a comfy hole-in-the-wall kind of place, not really a bar but not exactly anything else either. It was a special place, and she was dedicated to it like no tomorrow. With her passing came the eventual question of what the family was going to do with it. She hadn’t left it to any one of them in particular in her will, and nobody stepped up at first to take over its ownership. With no one making any grabs at it, it gave Ryan enough time to properly mull it over.

                He’d graduated college, sure, and had a decent job working in film production, but as of recently he wasn’t feeling as into it as he had in the past few years. He was beginning to burn out, something that hit the people in this industry like a plague. A split-second decision was made, and he was already on the phone with his mom before he could rethink it. In a week’s time and a long plane ride later, the title for The Thirteenth Chime bore his name, neatly written in dark blue ink that slightly spidered out into the old paper. Before he headed back home to turn in his 2 week notice and pack up his apartment, he wanted to go see it again.

                The day was dreary, grey clouds of varying shades hanging heavily in the sky as a soft misting of rain came down upon the town. The water clung to his clothes and his hair as he meandered down the near empty street, taking his time to observe the place he’d be living in for the foreseeable future. He’d been here many times to visit his grandmother, but never had he paid so much attention to the town itself. Many grand oak trees grew along the side of the road, their growing roots cracking the concrete into abstract patterns underfoot. Their branches swept out far and wide, forming almost a tree tunnel that felt like he was walking into another realm. A streetlight flickered lazily in the distance, the sounds of barking dogs and the occasional car echoing between the buildings. Ryan turned down one of the side streets, immediately spotting the hanging sign of what was now his establishment. It swung back and forth gently, moving with the slight breeze. “The Thirteenth Chime” was painted delicately in fancy black scrawl above a pair of ornate clock hands, pointing to the “Thirteenth” part of the sign.

                Ryan stopped in front of the door, its dark red paint looking worn and well loved. The hallway behind the glass was dark, only showing himself his own reflection. He stuck his hand into the pocket of his jacket, the ring of skeleton keys jangling as he pulled it out and began to sort through them. After a couple of attempts with keys that looked nearly identical to each other, the lock clicked open. He placed his hand on the doorknob and hesitated for a moment. This place was the source of many of his favorite memories of his family, especially his grandmother and the joy that she had brought to other people. He took a deep breath and pushed the door open gently, making a silent vow to himself as he stepped over the worn threshold that he’d try to do the same, for the sake of his grandmother’s memory.

                The place looked nearly the same as it did the last time he had seen it about a year ago. A bronze colored coat rack was bolted to the wall along the main walkway and Ryan took off his damp jacket, carefully hanging it on one of the many hooks. The wooden floorboards creaked quietly as he walked farther in and flipped on a light switch next to the doorway to the main room. The lights buzzed to life after a moment, casting a soft glow into the room as the ceiling fans lazily circled, barely moving the air enough to ruffle his hair slightly. Small tables were placed sporadically throughout the space with comfortable chairs encircling each one, all neatly pushed in. Along one wall ran the bar, its surface gleaming dully under the light as if it had just been cleaned. Stools were tucked up under the edge of it, waiting for people to come and occupy the space again. The back bar was tidy and well stocked, liquors of varying shades and bottles filling up the shelves and casting colorful splotches against the wall behind them, almost looking like stained glass.

                The floor along the back wall was raised, a few wide steps leading up to a platform where a band could play live music for patrons. One of the edges of the platform had a ramp instead of stairs, for wheeling heavier equipment up and for those who used wheelchairs. Sat against the wall at the back of this platform was an upright piano, made out of a dark reddish wood that Ryan could only assume was cherry. The cover was pulled over the keys, and the stool was out of the way under the piano. On the wall itself, a multitude of photographs and posters spread across it. Ryan walked over to the wall, quietly looking at all of this pictures that his grandmother had collected and painstakingly tacked to the wall. Many of them were her with people he didn’t know, old friends he assumed. As his eyes scanned over them, a couple near the middle caught his attention and brought tears welling up, but not quite spilling over. He carefully untacked one of them, bringing it closer so he could get a better look at it. It was a picture taken a couple years ago, before he moved away from family for his job. They were all smiling bright and happy, lined up against the floor to ceiling windows that made up the wall facing the street. A sad smile was on his face now as he tacked the picture back into its proper place on the wall, making sure he put it back exactly.

                A piece of paper fluttering to the ground next to him caught his attention. He leaned down and picked it up, looking at it curiously. It was sheet music for something, the notes hand drawn onto staffs that weren’t quite straight. In the bottom left corner was a faint “2”, indicating that it wasn’t the only page. He glanced over to the piano a couple feet away, looking for the rest of the sheets. A small white corner waved from the bottom edge of the seat of the piano bench, enticing him closer. Ryan lifted the edge of it and inside were 3 more sheets, the “1”, “3”, and “4” of the set. None of the pages had a title, just simply notes. He would’ve tried to play it, but he didn’t really know how to read music, much less actually play piano. For the time being, he tucked the sheets back into the space below the seat, shutting it again carefully.

                Besides a little bit of dust that had accumulated in the weeks since his grandmother had passed, the place looked pretty much ready to open again. Ryan walked back across the room, going further down the main hallway to a set of doors. Two of those doors were for the public bathrooms, the third locked. He managed to find the right key on the first try, and the door creaked open to reveal a set of stairs leading up into the dark. He felt along the wall for a moment, a quiet “aha!” coming from him as he flicked the light switch on. The light flickered a bit as Ryan climbed the stairs, making a mental note to get that checked out later. At the top of the stairs was a lovely dark green door. Ryan singled out the only key on the ring that he’d received that wasn’t a skeleton key, sliding it into the lock and clicking as he turned it. This was where he was going to be living now, on the second floor above the business.

                The space seemed eerily empty without all of his grandmother’s things taking up the space. Ryan wandered around the rooms for a bit, trying to plan where his furniture would be going when his things were here. The place was quite a bit bigger than the apartment he currently had, giving him considerably more space to work with. Ryan walked into the kitchen, taking a moment to remember the fun times with his grandmother while she tried to teach him and his brother how to make some of their family recipes. His gaze was drawn to the window that overlooked the street. The grey clouds that had occupied the sky were beginning to break up, casting dappled rays of sunlight over the street. Ryan noticed a tall man stopped in front of the building, looking curiously in the window before looking up to where Ryan was. He could see a smile on the man’s face as he waved up at him and Ryan waved back at him before watching him walk a few shops down and going inside.

                This was going to be the start of an adventure, but Ryan was more than ready for it.


	2. Found A Friend

                It didn’t take long for the news of him taking over his grandmother’s establishment to spread through the tiny town. The day he moved in was a day full of new faces, a plethora of names, and a life time’s worth of stories about his grandmother and the impact she had on the town as they had helped him move his boxes and furniture up into his new apartment. An idea began to blossom in Ryan’s head amongst the various mental lists he had fluttering around, like the first spring flower to break through the snow. He wanted to host a celebration of her life down in the main room, where people could share their stories with each other, listen to music, and just casually hang out. It’d be a good way to reopen the place and to honor her memory at the same time.

                The idea spiraled in his mind, distracting him from the menial task of carrying boxes and furniture up the stairs just to turn around and go back down. Before long, he was blinking out of his thoughts to the sound of the metal of the moving truck’s door clanging closed. As it puttered away, dark smoke belching out of its tail pipe occasionally, it was finally beginning to sink in. This was his life now, in a town full of people who he had just met, away from everything he had grown used to. If he had told himself from 10 years ago that this would be where he’d end up and be happy, his younger self would’ve just laughed. When the truck dipped out of sight, he turned back to the small group of people still hanging out in and around the building, their ambient chatter and occasional peals of laughter filling a space in his heart he didn’t know he had. He understood the appeal now, what drew his grandmother to this and what made her stay.

                One of them looked up from their conversation, waving him over with a smile. He recognized him as the person that’d waved to him from the street many weeks prior, the first person he’d interacted with since signing his name on the dotted line. He could tell he was tall from the window, but it was even more obvious when he was standing by literally anybody else. Ryan hesitated for a moment, only to be met by more vigorous motioning. Curiously, Ryan meandered over to the group, the other people bidding the man goodbye before he got there. It was a strange experience having to look so far up at someone else, it almost made him feel like a kid again, staring up in wonder at one of his older relatives. He offered his hand to Ryan, a bright smile on his face and an interesting light dancing behind his eyes. The wind tussled his already wild brown hair, giving him an almost surreal quality as Ryan shook his hand.

                “Hey man, I’m Shane. I run the bookstore just down the road, it’s nice to meet you.” Shane gestured to the other side of the road, about where the building he’d walked into after waving at him was. Shane didn’t necessarily strike him as a book person, but the mental image his brain conjured up definitely convinced him. Shane cooped up behind an old wooden desk, a pair of glasses perched on his nose as he worked his way through a novel sat on the desk. Shelves upon shelves of books, both brand new and intriguingly old, forming a sort of maze you could get lost in for hours spread out in the space before him, lit up by weak sunlight filtering through amber colored glass.

                “Nice to meet you too, I’m Ryan, but I have a feeling you probably know that already.” He was beginning to become used to it. News spread like wildfire here, and it seemed like everyone knew everyone else through some weird steps of connections. It’d only been a day and he’d heard more than enough stories about someone’s sister’s cousin’s uncle or some other lengthy and hard to keep track of combination to last him for a while.

                “Indeed I do, but formalities are always fun.” Shane was about to say something else when Ryan’s stomach growled loudly. He’d been too caught up in everything happening to actually eat anything, much less spend the time to think about it. Ryan was just on this side of mortified when Shane started laughing.

                “Sounds like you’ve got Chewbacca in your stomach, wanna go get something to eat?” Shane asked him, that bright smile right back in place. It’d didn’t take long for Ryan to decide, he hadn’t gone grocery shopping yet so there was absolutely nothing in his fridge, and he didn’t really know any of the good places in town yet.

                “Yea, sure, let me just lock everything up and I’ll be good to go.” Shane nodded at him and Ryan walked off inside. The rest of the goodbyes took a while, just because of how many people were still lingering around, but eventually everyone had left. Ryan flicked the lights off as he walked back outside, gently pulling the red door shut behind him. It only took him two tries to get the right key that time, and the lock thunked as he turned the key.

                After Ryan had pocket the ring of keys again, he turned to Shane, who was leaning up against the doorway with his phone in hand. “Ready?” He asked while tapping away on his phone screen for a moment longer before shutting it off and putting it into the pocket of his black and white striped hoodie. Ryan nodded in response and Shane began to walk farther down the road, leading Ryan away from the main streets. While Shane’s legs were much longer than his and he took longer strides, it didn’t take long for them to fall comfortably into pace with each other as they walked leisurely. A bit of casual conversation flowed between them, just simple things like how old they were, what area did they come from, the run of the mill first meeting kind of topics.

                They walked past a few other shops, Shane pointing them out as they passed, telling him about who owned what and a handful of stories he’d collected over the years. Shane came to a stop in front of one of them, pulling the glass door open, a chime tinkling overhead as they walked inside. It was a quiet little restaurant, only a couple people in booths here and there. Shane led him over to one of the empty booths towards the back, letting out a soft oof as he sat down onto the thinly cushioned seat. He pulled two menus out of the holder on the edge of the table, handing one off to Ryan as he began to peruse his own. Ryan flipped it open on the table, his eyes running down various options; it was a pizza place of some sort from what he could gather from the menu.

                Almost as if on cue, a waitress just seemed to appear out of thin air, asking in an out of place southern drawl what they’d like. When she had looked up to Ryan for his order, she looked confused, sparing a glance to Shane. “He’s the one taking over Chime” was the only explanation that Shane offered her and a look of realization crossed her face for a moment.

                “Well, I sure do hope you have a good time here, our town may be small but we’ve got a lotta love to give. Now, what’ll it be sweetheart?” She flashed him a wide smile, and even though this was the first time he’d met her, she brought an easy kind of comfort. Ryan rattled off his order and she was gone in a flash.

                “So, Shane, I had this idea that I could use a hand with…”


	3. Take Me Home

                It was a couple weeks after their little pizza outing, and he and Shane had become pretty close friends, almost attached at the hip. It had become commonplace that finding one without the other was quite rare, and this was one of those days. Shane was at work, and Ryan had been working on unpacking stuff, trying to at least make a somewhat clear pathway through the towers of boxes still left to go through, when a knock on the door startled him. He opened the door, revealing Shane standing there awkwardly, his hand raised as if he was about to knock again. He quickly pulled it back, reaching up to fiddle with a pair of clear frame glasses that sat on his nose instead. Bits of dirt and dust streaked his hands and forearms, along with a small smudge across his cheek.  The brief thought of ‘ _god, he’s cute_ ’ ran through his mind before he brought that train to a screeching halt. He wasn’t going to think about that right now, not with Shane literally standing 3 feet away from him.

                “Hey man, what’s up?” Ryan greeted him with a smile, it was actually quite nice to have someone come talk to him after a day of boxes and thoughts. ‘ _Especially with it being Shane’_ his mind unhelpfully replied.

                “Well, I uh… I just wanted to see if you needed some help unpacking or planning or anything? I probably should’ve called first, sorry.” Shane returned his smile, as he rubbed his hand on the back of his neck, looking a little sheepish. That was doing things to his heart he really did not want to think about.

                “No worries. Here, come in, leave your shoes at the door. I’m just need to finish up this box before we work more on the planning.” Ryan opened the door wider, inviting Shane in and gesturing to where he usually kept his shoes next to the door. He shut the door with a click behind them before going back to what he was doing.

                Ryan walked back into the living room and plopped down on the couch that was currently pushed to one side of the room. He pulled the box he had open closer towards him, going back to digging the clothing out of it. The sounds of Shane shuffling around in the hallway joined the noise of Ryan’s rustling, followed by the quiet thuds of his shoes hitting the floor. Ryan looked up as he walked into the room, watching as Shane’s eyes scanned around the room; it had slightly less boxes than last time he’d been over, and Ryan had gotten a chance to start hanging things on the walls. Shane picked his way through the jumble of boxes still strewn haphazardly across the floor, eventually joining Ryan on the couch as he sorted out the clothes into two piles at his feet. When he reached the bottom of the box, he flipped it over and grabbed a pocket knife that was sitting on the arm of the couch. With a metallic snap, he flicked it open, getting to work on the tape still holding the box together. The box collapsed once the tape was cut all the way through, shifting on the floor slightly as it folded in on itself.

                “Here, I’ll take care of that.” Shane picked the box up as he stood from the couch, walking over to where the rest of the broken down boxes were being stacked to be put into storage later. Ryan gathered up the first pile of clothes in his arms, hauling it over to the little closest with the washer and dryer in it. He threw one of the detergent pods into the washer before dumping the clothes in after it and shutting the top with a clang. He fiddled with the knobs for a moment before pushing the start button. The sound of the water filling into the washer wooshed behind him as he walked back towards the living room.

                “Alright, so planning ti-” As soon as Ryan felt his socked foot slip on the hardwood floor of the living room, time almost felt like it was going in slow motion. He tipped forward dangerously, no amount of arm flailing was going to save him from this one so he brought his arms up in front of him to hopefully break his fall (and not break his nose). He shut his eyes tightly, waiting for the hard impact to come, but he thumped against something squishy. Embarrassment flooded his mind as he realized that he had fell on Shane, who was currently holding him up by a strong grip on his arms and was hauling him back up to his feet. Ryan realized belatedly that he’d grabbed onto the front of Shane’s shirt in his moment of panic, and quickly untwisted his fingers from the fabric as his face heated up. Shane’s hands were still wrapped loosely around his arms and he was looking at him with something that looked way too close to affection in his eyes.

                “Sorry if I’m being a little forward, but can I kiss you?” Ryan was pretty sure his brain just stopped working at that point. He just blinked at Shane for a moment, a stunned expression on his face. ‘ _So much for not crushing on him, Bergara, did a real bang up job on that one’_ his brain unhelpfully supplied again. Ryan had taken too long to respond, too caught up in his own head, and Shane was pulling away with a slightly dejected look on his face.

                “Sorry, I-” Shane began, but was quickly cut off by Ryan, “yes.”

                “What?” Shane was now the one who was confused, tilting his head slightly like a puppy as he looked at Ryan.

                “Yes, it’s uh… it’s okay if you kiss me.” Ryan stammered through that a bit, but to be fair, he was about to get kissed by this tall lanky human that he had a crush on for some reason, that was excuse enough. Shane pulled Ryan closer by his waist and delicately cupped his jaw with his other hand, his thumb stroking adoringly across Ryan’s cheekbone. Shane tilted Ryan’s head up slowly, drawing ever so slightly closer by the second. Ryan’s eyes fluttered shut as he and Shane began to share the same air, and then his lips were pressing softly against Ryan’s. Ryan reached up and wrapped his arms around the back of Shane’s neck, pulling him even farther down towards him.

                When Shane pulled away, Ryan opened his eyes. The brightest sunshine smile he’d ever seen was currently on Shane’s face and he looked positively ecstatic. Ryan was pretty sure his own face was doing the same thing, but he was too happy to really pay attention to it. He wrapped Shane up in a tight hug, his face pressed into Shane’s chest and still smiling. He felt Shane’s long arms wrap around him in turn, holding him close and pressing kisses into his hair. Planning was a long-forgotten concept, the two of them just wanting to stay wrapped up in each other for as long as possible. That night was the first of many nights spent cuddling until they fell asleep curled up against each other.


	4. Go Back To The Places You Will Be From

                The day of the memorial was a hectic one, but a good one nonetheless. Raucous laughter and the constant murmur of various conversations happening at once filled the room not long after Ryan had opened up the tavern for the night. He was greeted by many people, most he’d met already but a few new faces here and there. Shane stuck by his side all the while, joining in on the retelling of fond memories of his grandmother where he could. Ryan heard a lot more stories that night, some that left his stomach aching from laughing too hard and others leaving him sniffling quietly while trying to hold back tears. The fun went on for hours, people slowly filtering out as the sun dipped under the horizon, giving up its space in the sky for the moon and the stars to fill.

                Shane kissed him goodbye at the doorway once everyone else had left, the bell above it jingling quietly as he made his way out onto the street. He watched Shane walk until the darkness of the street swallowed his form, hiding him from view. Ryan sighed and relaxed, the joy of the event going off without a hitch filling him with a bright kind of happiness that flooded his veins. He moseyed back into the main parlor, intent upon finishing up the last of the clean up so that he could call it a night. Ryan spared a glance at the grandfather clock that sat in the corner of the room, the hands pointing out 12:47. He had lost track of time amongst all of the raucous laughter and heart string pulling stories that came with everyone who’d stopped by, but he was far from any complaints.

                Ryan went behind the bar, picking up a rag from the side of the sink and running it through water before wringing it out. Meticulously, he began to wipe down the bar, the polished wood gleaming under the beading water as he worked.  He moved onto the tables after that, neatly pushing the chairs back underneath them as he moved around the room, cleaning to the tune of the music threading its way through his thoughts.

                The clock began to chime out the hour just as Ryan was finishing up wiping down the last table closest to the stage. He wasn’t really paying any attention to it, idly counting the chimes as he went to deposit his rag back into the sink.

_1_

_2_

_3_

He found himself thinking about ways that he could return the favor that Shane had done for him. Without his help, it would’ve taken so much longer to get everything set up for this event, and it meant a great deal to him that Shane took the time to assist. Their budding relationship was built on a solid foundation of close friendship, and he couldn't ask for anything more.

_4_

_5_

_6_

_7_

_8_

                It was now when he realized that the clock should’ve only chimed once. He looked curiously at the clock again, and it still read 1:00. He made a mental note to have someone come look at it. Maybe one of the internal mechanisms had been messed up?

_9_

_10_

_11_

_12_

_13_

A chill made its way through him. Even if the clock’s mechanism _had_ been calibrated incorrectly, it shouldn’t have chimed that many times. Ryan was about to write it off as him simply miscounting when a single note was played from the piano behind him. He froze in place, his back stiff and goosebumps running up his arms. Despite his brain screaming at him to not look and just run to Shane’s, he turned around slowly to look at the piano.

                The sheets of music he had found the first day, the ones he had put back away into the bench, were arranged neatly onto the music stand. The bench was pulled out just far enough for someone to sit comfortably and be able to reach the keys and the pedals underneath. As he looked closer, he noticed a single, white key pressed down. It thunked back into alignment with the rest a moment later, and Ryan breathed out a sigh of relief. That sigh caught in his throat when another note was played in succession, followed by another, and a chord. A gentle tune swirled out into the air as it continued. _The piano was playing itself._

Except no, that wasn’t right. A wisp of what almost looked like mist hung in the spot where a person would be if there was actually someone playing those notes. The longer Ryan stayed frozen in place and watching it, the more substance the wisp seemed to take on. It grew in size, clearly taking on the appearance of small hands dancing across the keys as it went. It spread like ink in water, the shapes it was taking on forming the rest of the arms, then a small torso, spreading down into legs with a foot set against one of the pedals and upwards into a young girl’s head. Her hair was done up in a pair of pigtails and the clothes she was wearing looked like they belonged in another era.

                Ryan’s heart leapt into his throat as the short tune finished and she turned to look at him from the bench. His breaths were coming in short staccato bursts as she swung her legs over the bench and walked towards him, stopping just in front of him. She grinned at him with a snaggletooth smile before reaching out and grabbing his hand. Ryan jumped at the contact; even though he’d witnessed with his own two eyes that she had came out of nowhere, her hand felt entirely too life like. The only difference was that it gave him a tingly sensation where she had a hold of his hand, a kind of numbness like holding ice against your skin for too long. The girl tugged on his hand, urging him to follow her over to the piano.

                As she lead him, he noticed other wisps forming in the room; an elderly man sat on a barstool, a guitar strapped to his back as he talked to another person with what looked like paint streaks across their face; a trio of women in southern belle style dresses congregated around one of the tables, colored in pastel pinks and blues; a man in soldier garb sat alone for a moment before another appeared, greeting him affectionately with a kiss and a smile. They noticed him in return, curious looks crossing their faces as they walked past and echoes of murmurs trickling into the air.

                The ghost girl sat him down at the piano before joining him at the bench and laid her hands on top of the keys. She played a string of notes slowly, her eyes on the sheet music sitting on the stand, although Ryan had a feeling she didn’t need them. Once she was done, she looked at him expectantly, gesturing towards the keys. Hesitantly, Ryan copied where her hands were placed, and she repeated the notes again. It took him a few tries, but he eventually was able to parrot them back to her. They worked line by line through the music until Ryan was able to play it slowly on his own. The girl clapped at his first successful pass of the song, a few more joining from behind him and brought a smile to his face.

                The sudden chiming of the clock startled him, and it counted off three times before quieting back to its constant ticking again. He wasn’t sure how he missed the chime for 2:00, but the clock face confirmed the chiming was now back to normal. The ghost girl’s smile was gone, a certain melancholy feeling filling up the room. Slowly, she brought her arms up and around him, hugging him tightly around his middle and hiding her face in his side. He blinked, and she was gone. Ryan glanced behind him, but the others had disappeared too, the only indication that they were ever there were the chairs pulled out from under the tables and the bar.

                He tried to play a note on the piano again, but it was out of tune.


	5. Every New Beginning Comes From Some Other Beginning's End

                For every night that The Thirteenth Chime was open for business, the spirits would come visit him as he cleaned up. Ryan figured that the building sat on top of a leyline, as the people that swirled into existence were never the same, except for the piano girl. On most nights, she would pull him over to the piano, whether it was to play together or to teach him a new tune. There were the rare times, however, when she’d never look up from the dancing of her transparent fingers across the keys. Those were the times where she’d play the most heart wrenching music, the notes hanging hauntingly in the air.

                It was a slow night, only two other spirits making an appearance, when Ryan finally asked the piano girl her name. She got up from the piano bench, moved over towards the back bar and pondered for a moment. When she appeared to find what she was searching for, she floated upwards, pointing at the name of one of the bottles sitting high up on a shelf.

                “Your name is Sheridan?” Ryan asked, just to be sure that he was understanding her correctly. She nodded enthusiastically, a wide smile on her face as she gracefully floated back down to the floor. The chime of the clock had cut the interaction short, and she was gone as soon as it ended. Ryan carried on the cleaning he had been working on previously, thinking the whole situation over.

                He had talked with Shane about the subject of ghosts before, some random conversation that sprouted from another after a movie night. He was most definitely not a believer in the supernatural, with the exception of apparently bigfoot (it was a very strange line of distinction that Shane drew, Ryan really didn’t understand it all that well). No matter what arguments or exampled Ryan had come up with, Shane had written them all off. He came up with everything that could explain them away, like the some of them were just the wind, or the active imagination of someone who was too tired or on something. In his mind, Ryan was laughing, because here he was, sitting just above a room that contained the exact thing he adamantly didn’t believe him. A plan started forming in Ryan’s mind: a way to get Shane to believe.

                Tomorrow was Friday. Shane always came by on Friday nights to hang around with Ryan while Chime was open, keeping him company amongst the other patrons that filtered in and out of the room. He was going to ask Shane to stay after hours, a guise to keep him there until the clock chimed off the strange hour. With any luck, the spirits would still appear, even with Shane there. With his plan in mind, he finished up the cleaning and headed up to bed, excited but a bit nervous.

 

* * *

 

                The time to enact his plan came quickly. Before he knew it, Shane was waltzing in to the establishment, greeting him with a peck on the cheek before sitting down at the bar. The barkeep Ryan had hired a few days prior was taking care of some of the other patrons, leaving Shane all to Ryan. He popped the bottle cap off of a beer and handed it to Shane. Conversation flowed between them as Ryan worked, eventually hitting a lull of pleasant quiet.

                “Hey Shane?” Ryan’s question drew Shane’s attention from people watching and he made an inquisitive noise, indicating for him to continue. “Would you mind helping me after hours tonight?”

                “Not at all little guy, happy to help.” Shane smiled around the mouth of the bottle as he took another sip. Their conversation went back and forth between random topics and comfortable silence until everyone else began to head out. The last person out was the barkeep, the bell on the door jingling behind her as she left for the night.

                Shane and Ryan got to work, cleaning the tables and the bar of the stickiness that seemed to be intent upon becoming ingrained with the wood itself. Ryan kept glancing at the clock, the minutes inching by ever so slowly. At 12:59, Ryan made his way over to the piano. The next minute felt like it lasted an hour as he watched the hands on the clock tick closer and closer. The first chime of the clock startled him with its noise, but he quickly sat back on the piano bench to watch the ensuing scene. Shane noticed that it was chiming more than it should far sooner than he had the first time.

                “I think there’s something wrong with your clock Ry- what are you doing?” Shane turned to look from the clock to Ryan, who was sitting expectantly on the piano bench. Ryan hushed him and gestured towards the empty room. Except, it wasn’t quite empty any more. Tendrils of mist leaked up through the floorboards and began to fill in shapes. Shapes of _people_ , Shane soon realized, as he watched in speechless awe. A young girl swirled into existence just in front of Ryan, who seemed to be excited to see him. She bounded towards him with a happy skip and gave him a hug, which Ryan returned with equal enthusiasm.

                “Shane?” Ryan asked him, dragging his attention from the ghost girl and back towards his face. He seemed amused, probably at Shane’s reaction to this whole situation that was currently doing its best to break his brain.

                “Uh?” There was no room for any sort of coherent responses, not while he was restructuring everything he knew about the world and how it worked.

                “This is Sheridan.” Ryan said as he put a hand on the top of the girl’s head. She grinned at him, a couple of teeth missing here and there from an otherwise blinding smile. As she did with Ryan, she raced towards him, but stopped just short of colliding with his legs. Sheridan looked at him curiously, then held out a hand to him, as if asking him to take it.

                “Go on.” Ryan encouraged from his spot on the bench. Looking between the two of them, Shane hesitantly reached out and took Sheridan’s hand. It was more solid in his grasp than he was expecting, and he definitely felt it when she began to tug him over towards Ryan. He let her guide him, standing him next to the piano and hopping back up with Ryan. As they started up a duet, Shane distantly noted that this was the first time he had ever heard the piano actually be in tune. He watched them play for a moment before movement caught his eye and he looked up to see more of those misty spots in the room.

                As the song went on, they became more solid. An older group of people sat at one of the tables, laughing merrily with each other and yet no sound emanated from any of them. A cat with a faint calico pattern sat on the edge of the bar, its tail hanging off the edge and flicking back and forth in an erratic beat. Sitting next to it was a person with their hair tied back into a pony tail, absentmindedly petting the cat while reading a book.

                “What do you think, Shane?” Ryan asked as he took his hands in his own. Shane’s eyes flicked down from the others to Ryan’s face. His bright sunshine smile was distracting, as was the enchanting flicker of joy in his eyes. Just when Shane was going to respond, an elderly lady who hadn’t been there before approached them. It didn’t take either of them long to recognize her.

                “Grandma?” Ryan asked incredulously, tears springing to his eyes almost immediately. The same smile that Shane saw on Ryan’s face so many times danced across hers as she nodded. Ryan dropped Shane’s hands from his grasp and hugged her, burying his face against her shoulder and sobbing audibly. Shane stood behind him awkwardly, not quite sure what to do in the situation.

                She solved that on her own, however. Gently, she pried Ryan off of her shoulder, rubbing a translucent thumb under Ryan’s eyes to wipe away the tears. She walked over to Shane and put her hands solidly onto his shoulders. She looked at him for a moment, searching his eyes for something. She seemed satisfied with what she found and her hands moved from his shoulders to gesture for him to lean down. A kiss was pressed to his forehead and when he stood back up, she simply mouthed a “thank you.”

                The clock chimed, startling Shane. He glanced to it briefly, and when he looked back, it was just him and Ryan again in an empty room, a trailing note from the piano dwindling off into the air.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading my fic!
> 
> If you want to send me prompts, tag me in things, or yell with me about AUs, you can find me on tumblr [here](http://www.skeptic-septic.tumblr.com/)
> 
> Kudos and comments are much appreciated :)
> 
> Cheers!  
> -Lee
> 
>  
> 
> **Also the ghost cat's name is Dave, he's Greg's cousin


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